Abstract

ACUNA, A; FUENTES, C  and  SMITH, C. A. DYNAMIC SIMULATION OF A FURNACE OF STEAM REFORMING OF NATURAL GAS. C.T.F Cienc. Tecnol. Futuro [online]. 1999, vol.1, n.5, pp. 35-44. ISSN 0122-5383.

Steam reforming of natural gas is a very important industrial process in refineries and ammonia and methanol plants. Hydrogen is produced by reforming methane with steam. This hydrogen is essential in the hydrotreating process in the refineries thus, it is important to supervise and control the performance of the hydrogen plant. Mathematical models of refineries and chemical plants are used to simulate the behavior of the process units. However, the models especially of reactors like reformers, are not very reliable. This paper presents a dynamic model of a furnace reactor. The simulation results are validated with industrial data.

Keywords : steam reforming; natural gas.